the hired hand

image credit: popcrush.com/2013-sxsw-survival-guide

 

***

Every year during Spring Break, the multimedia festival known as SXSW descends upon Austin, and in its wake come hundreds of thousands of visitors to the city. In 2015, the total number of registered participants in SXSW events was roughly 400,000, and while undoubtedly this number reflects some duplicates in terms of event attendance as well as a substantial number of resident participants, it also cannot account for the huge number of unofficial or unaffiliated sideshows that are put on for free all across the city. The cast of characters that floods our downtown during this week is as diverse as it is numerous, and included in this host is no small number of drifters, vagabonds, street performers, and otherwise just generally directionless individuals. They are asleep on sidewalks and in doorways; they are lined up around the block for some arbitrary musician dujour; they are posted up on a street corner with a guitar and an amp and two chords at their disposal; they are literally everywhere.

This situation seems to come to an unattractive head on St. Patrick’s Day. Along with the aforementioned crew, downtown gets littered also with people who feel the best way to celebrate the patron saint of Ireland (dubbed so because he brought the gospel to that country) is to find a place to get as inebriated as possible.

My walk from my downtown office to the train station a few days ago was infuriating. I had to step over self-proclaimed Rastafarians sitting cross-legged in the street, dodge a guy who fell over while holding a none-too-discreet sign asking for intercourse in exchange for a dollar (or vice-versa, it was hard to tell), and elbow my way through barriers of people who were milling around as if someone had just kicked the giant downtown ant mound. By the time I got to the train, I was actually livid, and this was exacerbated by the way people were trying to pack into the train going from whoknowswhat concert to whocareswhat irrelevant other show.

I suppose perhaps the most maddening thing about this experience is that, of course, none of these people seemed to care even the slightest that they were invading the space of people who wanted nothing to do with this whole fiasco, myself included. It is as if we, those who live and walk and eat in this space every day, were actually the outsiders, as if the space were actually theirs to begin with, and how dare we think of sullying their prized collective debauch with goings to and from work and home.

My wife has told me that I am prone to a certain condition, a certain tendency or proclivity for, oh, let’s call it grouchiness. Really, it is just being flat miserable. I call this condition C.O.M.S.: Crotchety Old-Man Syndrome. I may have even used the word “youthes” in my internal rant that day.

In the moment, I was truly enraged. But after a few days reflection, I began to feel very differently. There were a few important truths that I was overlooking that day, and as I thought more deeply about them, I began to develop a different perspective, and even feel convicted about my attitude towards this event and its participants.

First of all, even if it is true that the city doesn’t belong to these people, it doesn’t belong to me either. Thinking of it as my space was just as fallacious as them thinking of it as theirs. It was, in fact, an identical attitude. The perceived attitude of ownership and selfishness I encountered that was causing me so much resentment was actually the very same attitude in my heart. In reality, the city, as all things, belongs to all of us collectively, and more importantly, to the Lord. Everything I see as “mine” is only mine to steward, not to possess, and this includes my living space and my public transportation. It also includes my heart, and on this day I was stewarding none of them well, least of all the latter.

This leads me to my next point: this mindset of selfishness and of being “inconvenienced” by all the oblivious visitors to our city was causing me such great frustration that I was blinded to the immense and abundant opportunities around me to make a difference in the lives of those I encountered. Compounding my frustration was the fact that not only were so many people in my way, but they were in my way for something utterly stupid: songs. I mean, songs are great and all, but how in the world, I thought, could they be so great that anyone would be able to put up with this nonsense: with the crowds, the noise, the smells, the abject debauchery, etc.?

But this should not have been a cause for frustration for me; rather it should have been a cause for deep concern and sympathy. Why would they put up with all of this for what I deemed nonsense? Well, because that is where their hope lies. Those who come for the music do so because there is some sort of beautiful spirituality in songs, a sense of connection perhaps that touches something in them that nothing else can. Those there for the films? About the same, I imagine. Those there for just the “experience” of it? You see where I am going. Everyone there was looking for something. Something unforgettable. Something, in a sense, defining. A moment in their lives that would have significance for as long as those lives lasted. The participants wanted to discover something new about art, and consequently about themselves. The musicians on the street playing wanted to be discovered. Everyone there wanted something tangible, something genuinely, truly real.

Many of them, it was easy to see, has been searching for this a long time, and had perhaps given up hope on ever finding it. I don’t know if I have ever seen more dejected, desperate, lonely faces in one place in my life. Faces whose names I didn’t bother to know, didn’t want to know. Faces that I just wanted to forget as quickly as I saw them.

Of course, I know that what they need is not in fact music. It is not art. It is not a chance to “make it” as a musician or a filmmaker. It is not to have their technology go viral. Because none of these things, even if they shout loud promises that they will, can fulfill us. But again, neither can avoiding them. Just as their peace cannot be found in making or experiencing all these wonderful crafts, mine cannot be found in an unmolested walk to the train, or in a quick escape from the city.

In John 10, Jesus tells the parable of the Good Shepherd, highlighting the differences between his relationship to his sheep and everyone else’s. One passage in particular stands out as pertinent here: “He who is a hired hand and not a shepherd, who does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees, and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. He flees because he is a hired hand and cares nothing for the sheep.”  (vv. 12-13)

As a steward of my life and my body and the place where I have been given to live, I am the hired hand. And all of the people I pass every day, and all of the people crowding the streets during these festivals, are Jesus’s sheep. They belong to him, and yet they are in my path. They are given, in a sense, into my charge, even if just for a few seconds. And yet, on this day, all I could think about was fleeing to safety. I was surrounded by people who needed, most of them desperately, to hear the gospel, to find at last the real thing they had been seeking, the saving truth that far supasses all success and relevance and creation; and yet, somehow, though the harvest was so ripe, I had no desire to work the field. Though it pains me to say, I must confess, I care nothing for his sheep.

Contrast this with how Jesus in the same passage speaks of himself in verses 2-4: “But he who enters by the door is the shepherd of the sheep. To him the gatekeeper opens. The sheep hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he has brought out all his own, he goes before them, and the sheep follow him, for they know his voice.” And in 9-11: “I am the door. If anyone enters by me, he will be saved and will go in and out and find pasture…I came that they may have life and have it abundantly. I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.” And yet again, in verses 14-18: “I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep. And I have other sheep that are not of this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd. For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life that I may take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord.”

Consider the language he uses here: he calls his sheep, he goes before them, he leads them. He comes to them. He will bring them to good pasture. He wants to give us life, and abundantly. And how does he do so? He lays down his life of his own accord. Language of such rich and profound care, such grace, such sympathy, such utter and absolute love.

All of this is in such stark contrast to what I do, what I did in fact, and how I felt on St. Patrick’s Day. Jesus would not scoff at these people. He would not avoid them. He would not shoulder his way through them to get where he was going. In fact, they would be where he was going. They wouldn’t be in his way, nor even on his way. They would be his destination. He wouldn’t retreat as quickly as possible to the safety of the suburbs. In fact, I believe he would do the exact opposite. He would retreat from the suburbs as quickly as possible and rush to care for his sheep.

My offhand thoughts about the way people celebrate St. Patrick’s Day now seem fairly hypocritical. Perhaps intentional intoxication is a foolish way to honor the great evangelist, but it is no more or less foolish than ignoring or being downright hostile to people in dire need of a message of hope.

This must be what it means to have a heart of stone. I can honestly say I felt nothing for these people on that day. My only thoughts were of myself. My only feelings were discomfort and inconvenience and anger. There was no love in anything I said or did on that 15 minute walk. My heart was a cold, dead, rock. And I know of nothing, no physical force, no substance, no book, no activity, that can change a rock into flesh. Only a supernatural miracle, only a heart transplant, can accomplish that. I don’t just need my heart softened; I need a new one entirely. This one is ruined.

So I pray, and I ask that you will pray with me, and for me, that God will perform this surgery in me again. I pray that I will become like the Good Shepherd: someone who runs toward the mess, and looks for ways to serve those in it and lead them out of it. I cannot continue to be someone who simply serves my own needs and stony desires. Jesus wouldn’t run from the mess. He would walk right into it and try to love it as much as possible. Even if I didn’t know this from the Scriptures or from the book of John, I know this from my own life. Because that is what he did for me. He entered into all of my unholy, disgusting mess and loved me intensely, genuinely, undeniably. I want to love like that. Because if I “have not love, I am nothing.”

***

an ode for you

photo credit: “Bach Invention 13″ by Debra Hurd (http://www.dailypainters.com/paintings/240853/Bach-Invention-13-music-classical-painting-art-by-Debra-Hurd/Debra-Hurd)

 

an ode for you

 

Tell me something that you

love.

 

Be it a bread I will

bake it,

a gift I will

bring it;

a craft I will

make it,

a song I will

sing it,

 

though I am

not much

of a craftsman,

I can

read instructions;

 

and though i am

not much

of a chef,

I can

follow a recipe;

 

even though I am

not

much

of a singer,

yet still

I can

carry a tune.

 

***

 

oh to die instead in egypt

photo credit: www.devon-photography.com

***

i do not know

  much of the sea

    (i have yet to get my

      sea-legs and remarkably i

        still get ill at the

          waves, most of the

            time) and yet even

              i can tell that boats

                left unsailed and unanchored

                  will neither stay moored

                in the place they were

              docked nor will they by

            glorious happenstance

          reach some tranquil unknown

        beach on foreign shores but

      very likely will simply

    run aground in the

  very place that they

just departed

***

Fiction is a Fiction. (or: Fiction is History)

photo credit: Huffington Post

***

Let’s begin with a limerick, because they’re fun:

There once was a young man from Austin

who wrote stories one could get lost in.

But the actual cost:

‘Twas the plot that got lost

And his readers just wound up exhausted!

I have decided that, at least for now, I’m going to give up on writing fiction. There are a few reasons for this, but the most notable one is that I am really not good at it. This is not to say that I couldn’t be good, if I were to continue practicing, which I might do in my spare time, but I don’t think there will be much posting of fiction, at least on this blog. (Readers rejoice.)

My writing gifts (modest as they are) lie much more in the realms of non-fiction (read: short opinionated essays that require no research) and poetry, so I think for the most part I want to concentrate on these.

Fiction still appeals very strongly to me, but I have to confess a great deal of this appeal comes from the possibility of selling a work of fiction and reaping either financial rewards or notoriety. Neither of these should be goals of mine, at least not if I am writing purely for the sake of writing. If they end up being ancillary advantages, I wouldn’t turn them down, but if they are an objective, if they are an intent, then my work will be tainted, even if it ends up being well-respected. I have talked before about my feelings regarding bandwagon fiction, and though I am hardly alone or revolutionary in this outlook, I nevertheless feel that the perversion of writing (or the co-opting of it, perhaps) simply for the sake of financial gain leads to phenomena like this, and shortly thereafter what would previously have been called “romance” novels completely overwhelm the “Fiction and Literature” section at the bookstore.

I don’t want any part of this, and I do not wish to be a writer who succumbs to any emotionally dishonest trend. But let’s be realistic: I was light-years away from this objective anyway. The first step in making marketable fiction is to write something that interests people, and I haven’t done that yet, at least not in my fiction. But regardless, I want to at least nip in the bud the proclivity for sacrificing art, sacrificing the potential to make something truly meaningful, on the altar of success.

And just as a disclaimer, do not think I am of the opinion that all writers who have achieved a level of financial success or critical acclaim are doing something wrong. I am reminded of this verse, though it is perhaps only loosely applicable:

“Then Jesus said to his disciples, ‘Truly I tell you, it is hard for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of heaven. Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.’”  – Matthew 19:23-24

I think the same is perhaps true of people who are truly following a calling. Perhaps it is not impossible to remain artistically uncompromised following success, but it sure is freaking difficult. That’s why I don’t even want to start down that path at all. Instead, if you want to find me, I’ll be in the (pitifully meager) poetry aisle.

***

Oh For the Love of All Things Theatrical

***

I’m not sure whether it is the third or fourth year in a row now, but what began as a budget move and continued as a way to avoid horrendous crowds has now become a Valentine’s Day tradition for Sara and me: going to our favorite Tex-Mex restaurant. That’s about as fancy as we like to get on February 14th. Frankly, we couldn’t give two hoots about the day. But before you start to think that I am one of those vehemently opposed, I’m-so-against-Valentine’s-day-it-rules-my-life-just-as-if-I-am-celebrating-it people, I want to demonstrate clearly where I stand on the day.

It isn’t that I am against the alleged holiday, it’s just that it loses its lustre when it falls in this cluster of events:

11/27: Sara’s birthday

12/15: Our wedding anniversary

12/25: Christmas

1/1: New Year’s Day

2/23: My birthday

We have plenty of occasions to celebrate and commemorate our love during that 3 month stretch. Valentine’s just doesn’t stack up. In general, however, I am very much in favor of being intentional about marking special occasions with a spouse. This one just isn’t all that special. Now if it fell in June or something, it might be a good excuse to get off our duffs and make sure that we were appreciating one another.

And that’s the real essence of Valentine’s day: to demonstrate that you appreciate your spouse or your beloved. My marriage has been chock full of occasions for grand gestures; it has been riddled to near saturation with Valentine’s Days. But this is because I was always playing catch-up. February 14ths have been pretty good for us, at times. Where I have dropped the ball is on the February 15ths of our relationship. On the May 3rds. The August 12ths. As it turns out, my marriage is much richer now not because I occasionally make some grand Say Anything radio gesture, but because I make an effort to show Sara that she is appreciated every day. Now, I do not always succeed, but I have come to realize that marriage isn’t always (in fact is rarely) about pink balloons and candy hearts. Most of the time, what makes Sara feel most appreciated is when I get up first thing in the morning and make sure that I am in prayer about my sinister heart. What makes her feel valued is when I take care of things that I say I am going to take care of without her having to ask. What makes her feel special is when I listen when she is speaking rather than being distracted by my phone or by the TV or by what scathingly brilliant remark I am going to make next.

Again, let me be clear: I am a fan of the romantic, there is no question. I like giant surprises, I like giving thoughtful gifts, I like serving her unbidden. But if I do not love her in the smallest of details, then all of these things are merely compensation for my failures to love her in actuality.

Christ’s love for us certainly took on the form of the grandiose: the grandest romantic gesture of all, in fact, still belongs to Him. However, He also continues to love us every day in the small things, too; in the petty, in the unworthy, in the seemingly insignificant. It is my belief, in fact, that He wants to be involved in everything we do. He wants to be involved when we are choosing what shoes to wear, when we are deciding on our meal, and when we are brushing our teeth (or forgetting to do so).

Psalm 139 says:

“O Lord, you have searched me and known me!

You know when I sit down and when I rise up;

you discern my thoughts from afar.

You search out my path and my lying down

and are acquainted with all my ways.

Even before a word is on my tongue,

behold, O Lord, you know it altogether.

You hem me in, behind and before,

and lay your hand upon me.

Such knowledge is too wonderful for me;

it is high; I cannot attain it.

Where shall I go from your Spirit?

Or where shall I flee from your presence?”

This, as it turns out, is what love truly is. He sees us and knows us in every small detail. He is acquainted with all of our ways, and yet never leaves our side. Scripture says countless times that the Lord’s love is steadfast. It does not ever change or waver, regardless of whether my heart does (which it does). If I am to love my wife as Christ loved me, then absolutely I should commemorate special occasions. I should absolutely reach out and make profound gestures of my love for her, particularly when things are not going well. But I unequivocally cannot leave it at that. I must every day, in the smallest of actions, even actions that do not directly concern her, be loving her. Then, regardless of when Valentine’s Day falls, and regardless of what we do to celebrate, it will be certain to be wonderful.

***

Reunions

***

Your steadfast love, O Lord, extends to the heavens, your faithfulness to the clouds.  – Psalm 36 : 5

***

Not long ago i had the joy of attending a reunion of some of my friends from high school. Initially i had quite mixed feelings about the event. There were, of course, a few friends who i was very excited to see, knowing that our friendship from school remained (mostly) intact and untainted. Overwhelmingly though i felt a tremendous sense of dread about encountering many of the attendees; i had not left a good impression on many people while in school, and i could only begin to guess at how much this would still be a factor.

The evening was quite pleasant at first, comprised primarily of the standard exchange of updates. Conversation centered around jobs, children, living locations, and other sundry pieces of data about each person’s current situation. It wasn’t long, however, before talk naturally shifted to more nostalgic ground, and tales from our time together 15 years prior began to surface. This, of course, was the part of the evening i had been dreading all along.

i will spare you the details, because some of the stories i heard about myself are truly too embarrassing to pen, but suffice it to say that even i was shocked at the level of callousness, selfishness, and utter depravity that the character Rich Wilson exhibited in some of these stories. With no exaggeration, i can honestly say that i was such a pompous and disgusting ass in high school that i had forgotten some stories that most people would remember with cringing horror. In essence, i had done so many awful things to people that my memory could not contain them all.

Reflecting on this later in the evening, i found myself shaken to no small degree as a result of these encounters. This event revealed two things about my heart, things which i knew to be true but clearly needed to be reminded of. First, it still matters to me a great deal what people think of me, so much that i believe it is somewhat idolatrous. While it is true that i should be concerned with how i come across to other people, i should only have this concern in the context of my identity in Christ. My primary concern should be reflecting Christ’s love to the world, and not what opinion people may have of me. If anything, my self-image issues frequently get in the way of this reflection, and often i find myself less bold about the gospel than i ought to be for fear of seeming crazy or silly. Secondly, i have a tendency to dwell on the mistakes of my past, so much so that sometimes this becomes my identity. My mistakes and inadequacies also have relevance only in the context of the gospel: they display, if i allow them to, how deep is the Father’s love and how powerful is His redemptive might. If He can love even me, He can surely love anyone.

Somewhere between the abject blind selfishness i showed in high school and the co-dependency i exhibit in current relationships lies the proper place for my heart. This place creates a man who is aware of his failures and yet not afraid to show them because in them Christ’s ultimate grace is displayed. This place creates a man who is concerned with how others see Christ, not himself. In this place, my image is of no consequence; in this place, i am not afraid in the least of looking like a fool so long as it is done for the sake of loving God and loving others well.

Outside of this place, there is only worry, guilt, shame, and dark, weary stories from the past. i do not want to forget these stories entirely, because they remind me of who i was, and they remind me of who i would be without Christ. At the same time, i need not fear these stories nor run from them any longer. i may concern myself with how others feel about them for the sake of healing and amends, but i myself can be free to feel nothing about them. That man, praise God, has been and is being put to death each day.

Ultimately, the only opinion of me that matters is God’s. It would be great if these people learned to love me, but if they do not, God has chosen to, and that is not only enough, it is everything. i would be lying if i said i understood it, and even to say such is humbling beyond words, but for purposes of His own He has chosen to see in me His child. i pray that i will learn to see myself in the same light.

***

The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end.  – Lamentations 3 : 22

What i learned while i was away

***

Wondering if i still have the knack for this. Or the stomach. I was so driven, so committed, so wonderfully enthralled such a short time ago, but so much has changed since then. Other things have just seemed to loom larger. i am a little embarrassed at this point that i made such a big deal out of the importance of writing in my life, although i am not sure if this is because i was right or not about that importance. Either way, makes me look kind of foolish. Either it is not important, and i allowed it to take over, in which case i am obsessive and fickle, or it is important and i haven’t done it in months, in which case i am simply lazy and sluggish. Either way there is a weakness involved; i am like a building in constant danger of collapse. This isn’t the result of wear or age as in the case of some buildings, though there has been plenty of use, but rather the result of neglect. i have forgotten to install certain mandatory frameworks that contribute to structural integrity. i have skipped over essential elements of the building code to save time and effort. (Something like that. My sense of metaphor atrophies.)

Recent events have actually highlighted this in my life somewhat strongly, and through the process i have actually learned a little bit about weakness. Some time ago i learned that self-deprecation and arrogance were not opposites as they may be defined, but were in principle two sides of the same egoist coin. They were, at root, exactly the same sin: the sin of overt self-focus. Whether that focus manifests itself as depression or haughtiness depends largely on whether or not the person has had good fortune. The sin itself remains the same.

Frailty, i have learned, is much the same. It may seem to be the opposite of over-reliance on one’s own strength, but in reality the lie at its heart is identical. Those who rely merely on their own strength are clearly not in recognition that it is the Lord who gives them strength. They are obviously not acknowledging that there will be times when human strength is insufficient, and that all strength ultimately comes from the Lord. It is no different for those who, by believing they are weak and frail, commit to idleness or inaction. They too believe the same lie: that the Lord does not provide all strength.

There have been many changes in my life in the past few months, some of which i may delve into at some point, but all of which have been both a difficulty and a blessing. These have tested my resolve lately, and i have been found wanting. i have fallen into the trap, the old familiar trap, of believing that i am incapable; that i am not adequate to the task, whatever the task may be. Most often, that task was loving my wife well. It is easy when i am tired and stressed to believe that i do not have the strength to have patience with her or to be kind. And this may be true. But this is not an end result, merely a jumping-off point. There is actually value in recognizing my weakness, so long as it leads me to the cross, where i may be replenished. If instead, as it has lately, it leads me to self-pity or to the hollow comforts of ineptitude, then all value in it is lost.

Looking back on this post, i realize that what is missing is the anecdotal element of a good blog, and that there are no specifics herein. i also can recognize that the form is a bit sloppy and undefined. Don’t worry, i’ll get there. It will just take a little time to get my chops back. But this, too, is part of strength: committing to be just a bit better next time.

***

Honey from the Rock

There’s no falling back asleep once you’ve wakened from the dream  – from “February Seven” by The Avett Brothers

***

Is it possible a scent can actually hurt? That the right particulate olfactory matter can actually translate through some registering synapse into legitimate pain?

I didn’t go there with any purpose other than to kill time. Get out of the house for a while. Stretch my legs. Live up to some other clichéd phrase about wanderlust or boredom or some such sensation. I certainly, at least on the conscious level, didn’t go there to catch fire or to have life breathed into my stagnant malfunctioning lungs. I hadn’t been there in months, in fact. Used to go every day it seems. Did some of my greatest work there, though greatest is at best a relative term and at worst a complete misnomer. My portfolio, to date, hardly includes anything that merits the creation of a ranking system.

But the smell. It burned like icicles on bare hands. I’ve been to coffee houses many times since, and I drink coffee every day, so it couldn’t possibly have been just the coffee. Instead it must have been some amalgamation of that scent mingled with the aromas of unread novels and newsprint that did the killing; or rather, undid it. I found myself almost unwittingly back in the bookstore which during my fervent writing days I often haunted. Now instead it was I who was the haunted: potent, almost feverish, memories of those days when I felt right with my purpose and place in the universe now plagued me as I wandered from shelf to shelf. I felt like an amnesiac almost; there was a lingering and perfect sense that something significant had happened here, but I couldn’t grasp it, couldn’t lay hands to it and hold it tangibly, lift it to the light and inspect it. Instead I could only walk from floor to floor in the store, wondering, fearing. I was covert, on the sly, sneaking almost, either hiding from something or desperately searching for it. Rows of books that I had never read assailed me like the faces of people I thought I should recognize, yet I was adrift in a crowd of strangers.

I settled on a book, almost at random (although I have my doubts that anything is truly as arbitrary as it may seem) that was a compilation of essays by various successful writers about their motivations for pursuing the craft.

Not one of them said they did it for the money.

I would love to claim that I didn’t know the reason I stopped writing, but that would be a lie. I know exactly why and when it happened. Truthfully, I didn’t actually stop writing altogether, I merely stopped doing it for myself and began doing it for someone else instead. There was an immense and seductive thrill in this: someone actually wanted to give me money in return for borrowing my skills. Isn’t this, after all, what we all dream about? What we all think we need? Finding someone who is willing to pay us for doing what is our passion?

I have awakened from a dream that was not mine, as if while I slept my mind was transported into someone else’s body. In truth, money is a beautiful and alluring mistress, and an absolute, horrid lie. I probably run the risk of alienating my employers by even saying all of this, but nevertheless I felt snapped out of a coma in that store. I have left something essential, fundamental to who I am behind to pursue something that is not only unsatisfying, but ultimately unreal. I haven’t felt so sad and wonderful at the same time in a while. It is the blessed delicious hurt of tonguing a sore tooth or pressing on a knotted muscle. I feel bruised and bloody, like a survivor of a building collapse or a car accident, and I have the same sense of contrite gratitude at still being alive, the same sense of having narrowly escaped a crushing and tragic fate.

Who can say why the Lord gives us what He does? The obvious answer, of course, is that we need whatever He supplies, but sometimes it seems He gives us those things not so that we may be satisfied by them, but so that we may truly know that they do not satisfy. It is hard to say, but it seems this might have been the case for me as far as my recent “jobs” are concerned. I will undoubtedly continue the “professional” gig for a time, at least to fulfill my contract, but I am beginning to be possessed of the notion that said path is not for me. After all, money comes and goes, but the impressions we make upon our brothers may echo many lifetimes into the future. This is what writing should be about. Forgetting that was like forgetting my own name.

And I already hear the clamor: Rich, you have said this before. In fact, I can recall several posts, (this one and that, among others) in which you stated nearly the same thing. What can I say? My heart is fickle, and a liar. No doubt in a few months I will need to learn this lesson again. In the meantime, while this correction is fresh (and since this prose is awful and meandering and utterly indicative of someone who is out of practice), I will stop boring you with all of this and get on with some real writing.

May the results matter not nearly so much as the reason for the act.

***

I am the Lord your God,
who brought you up out of the land of Egypt.
Open your mouth wide, and I will fill it.

“But my people did not listen to my voice;
Israel would not submit to me.

So I gave them over to their stubborn hearts,
to follow their own counsels.

Oh, that my people would listen to me,
that Israel would walk in my ways!

and with honey from the rock I would satisfy you.”

Psalm 81 : 10 – 13, 16b

Stranger, and more beautiful

***

Fiction has long been a part of my life. There have been books historically which i have read and re-read incessantly throughout my life. When i was a child and a teenager, most of these tales took the form of fantasy or science fiction. Even fancied myself a bit of a fantasy writer at one point, and i still feel as though i could set down a rather rousing epic if i put my mind and (more importantly) my heart to it. Some period of time into my early adulthood i started shifting my reading and writing interest to more “literary” fiction, whatever that nomenclature signifies. i have begun and left unfinished no fewer than five novels, having never caught sufficient steam or momentum, or perhaps having never had the requisite discipline, to see these projects through to completion. My reading in this arena has been, for a time, rather diligent at least, and there is certainly a tremendous and nameless appeal that the fictive voice holds in my heart. It is not out of the realm of possibility that i may at some point dig up from under the earth of time and business these efforts and breathe life into them anew.

Poetry has also competed for dominance in my aesthetic sensibilities, and though i have not quite had the patience to study it as thoroughly as i ought, there are still times when it seems that the only mechanism which will do a subject justice is the poem, thus as you can see i have written my fair share of them. Most of them are at the very least elementary, and some even go so far as to be downright terrible and asinine.

Recently, however, despite my traditional attachment to these slightly more artistic forms of communication, i have begun to suspect that perhaps my gift really lies in the area of non-fiction. i have never written very much of it, save on this particular blog, and even though the bulk of my posts here can be classified as non-fiction, they still feel fictitious, at least in the sense that they are driven by narrative rather than by research. i must confess i owe at least a portion of this suspicion to my wife, who first pointed out that she found my non-fiction to be my best work. Lately i have toyed with idea of working more exclusively in this domain, and it is starting to gain sway for me. i suppose what always steered me away from writing non-fiction was a lack of qualification. i am an expert in precisely zero subjects, save perhaps the subject of myself. But perhaps this is enough. Perhaps there is enough of a story in my life – and i suspect there is, not because i have lived a particularly adventurous or meaningful life, but because i have lived a particularly rebellious one – to merit its writing. After all, God has written a rather amazing story already, having provided for me time and time again despite my unwillingness to receive that provision. i think perhaps i will stay away from fiction, at least for the time being – God is, after all, a better story-teller than i will ever be – and stick strictly to writing about my experiences with Him and the recovery He has seen fit to mercifully bring into my life. Maybe in this, at last, after a year of dabbling in essentially every variety of writing and succeeding at none, i have found my calling. Time however, will tell.

The well-known adage “truth is stranger than fiction” has a less-familiar second clause, which i find even more profound than the first. “It is because,” Twain says, “fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn’t.” If you had asked me 30 months ago what i dreamed would be “possible” for the coming years, for my personal and spiritual life, for my career, and for my marriage, i would not have been able to even begin to guess at the current shape each of those elements has in my life. i believe that the purpose of writing is to provide insight and wisdom into the life of another, and by doing so, be a force for peace, for reparation, for reconciliation. Fiction gives us a certain view of truth through its exploration of possibilities, and poetry another through its propensity for ambitious metaphor, and both can provide some measure of universality, and thus each may, in part, accomplish the objective of establishing commonality. But God has written a truth, full and glorious, that no human word can sufficiently capture, and in my case, as it is for many of us, that truth is more compelling and more exhilarating, and thus ultimately vastly more unifying, than any story or device which we have ever conceived of or read. These stories, our stories, with all of their ugly and rambunctious and supercilious components, are the stories which people most need to hear. These are the stories that will heal, because ultimately they are not about us at all. Tell yours, and i will do mine.

***

Shotgun: seven microessays

***

These words stumble out slowly, like 2 am bar patrons, steeped in a forgetfulness wrought by intentional neglect. Productivity is always the fruit of a well cultivated garden, and this one has gone unweeded and unkempt for weeks.

***

Watched a movie the other day (which is the lazy man’s reading). Protagonist was a 30-year old stoner who still lived with his mother. Believe it or not, this actually appeals to me: there is a certain muck of the effortless life that one can rest in, and though it is sad and empty it is also safe and unburdensome. On some level, it’s not as bad as it seems. After all, the struggle to find meaning perpetuates, whether one is by worldly standards a success or a failure. If you don’t believe me, read Ecclesiastes.

Rambling, i know. i’ll get to it soon. This is what happens when you don’t write for a while: your efforts become unfocused, undisciplined, scattery blasts hoping that what they lack in precision they make up for in force, unaware that in many cases, precision is force.

***

There’s some saying about idleness. Devil’s workshop or somesuch. Chicken or egg situation here, as i see it. Not sure whether idleness gives room for the devil to work, or whether he uses anxiety and uncertainty to produce idleness. “Produce idleness” is a stupid phrase, oxymoronic and imprecise. A month ago i would have cared about that.

The question, i guess, is whether idleness is the root or the fruit. This is always the question, with any behavior. My guess is fruit, since it corresponds to the assertion that productivity is also the fruit, although one could argue that they are somewhere in the middle. Branches or vines that carry (or, more often, don’t) fruit, dependent on nourishment themselves but not ends, not terminal. It makes little sense to think of productivity as a fruit, since by its very definition it must produce in order to be itself. But just as it is not terminal, it is not original either. i know this because my own has been deeply pruned lately.

***

Lots of things i could blame. Sleep. Work. Nice weather. Video games. It has been mostly a question of energy. I have put more into work lately, and God has seen fit for a time to bless this work with success, and my store of energy is not infinite. Not really sure how people manage to have hobbies, jobs, and children all at once. Seems to me that even trying to juggle two of the three is a mere impossibility, and for many of us even one demands more of our energy than we have. Nice weather prompted me to spend more time outside recently. Can’t argue that this is a bad thing, really. I’m pretty pasty if i don’t, and it has been my only relief from idleness.

***

Video games. Wish i knew what it was about these that appealed to me so strongly. i suspect it is the element of the vicarious. Somehow by being even more idle, even more unproductive, i can still experience the thrill of being a hero, eat from the gift-basket of dedication, all without ever putting on pants. In the last few weeks i have made 20 million dollars, won both the World Series and the PGA Championship, and slain at least half a dozen dragons. What have you done?

***

Company coming tonight, which meant last night was cleaning night. Somehow the cleaning itself is not only not miserable, but almost enjoyable. The hardest part is getting up off of the sofa and getting started. Once that mountain is climbed, the actual activity is mostly descent, a slow stroll down into a lush meadow.

***

We’ve given it the innocent, innocuous name sleep. i guess this is because rheum is too abrasive a term. My eyes have been full of it lately, and it takes an hour or two before i can get them clear. Calling it sleep distracts us from the fact that it is actually mucus, and an overflow of this into our eyes usually indicates that we are congested, even infected. No wonder we changed its name.

Waking happens in an instant, and yet not. I am awake now, and shaking the congestion. It will be sometime, though, before i can see clearly again.

***